“What got my foot in the door for Joe was I was playing consistently, I was injury-free and I was putting in good performances back to back.

“We were doing well as a back-three unit so that’s what got me in there. Then this year has just been very disruptive. It is massively disappointing to get that call. But Joe said, ‘You need to play consistently and you have a couple of injuries this year’. That’s what I am trying to do, get back playing 80 minutes.”